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State GOP Hopefuls Urge California to File Suit Against Health Care Legislation
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger yesterday said the national healthcare plan could cost California billions. Gubernatorial hopeful and current Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner also chimed in with similar sentiments, followed by his Republican opponent Meg Whitman. And so are the three Republicans seeking to replace Senator Barbara Boxer in the November election.
And if California is going to officially challenge Obama and congress on the landmark legislation, Republicans are going to have to get through to Attorney General Jerry Brown, who is also running for Governor.
"Thirteen attorneys general, all but one are Republican, are rushing to kill the federal healthcare bill by filing lawsuits alleging that the bill violates states' rights," he said in a statement this afternoon. "Here in California, a handful of Republican leaders have followed suit and are asking that I join in. Accordingly, I've instructed deputies in my office to carefully review these claims in light of applicable constitutional principles. Health care is not the place, with people's lives at stake, to engage in poisonous partisanship. At this critical time in our nation's history, we need to come together to forge a common purpose."
In a radio interview earlier today, Brown said "Our lawyers don't read a 2,200-page bill overnight. Whether it's violating the Constitution, I would want to have a serious analysis and then reflect on it. You just don't pop out, 'Oh, it's against the Constitution!' " That's really politics."
Brown is also being pushed by state politicians like state senate GOP leader Dennis Hollingsworth who said this at a press conference: "I think that many Californians share the same view that ... this is the greatest expansion of government in a generation and it is also the greatest intrusion into personal liberty and states rights that we have seen in many generations."
The healthcare bill was passed by congress on Sunday and signed by President Obama today.
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